It makes as much sense to me as the fact that winning a major championship is worth 600 FedEx Cup points but winning the first playoff event, the Northern Trust Open, is worth 2,000 points. Of course it is.

What I’m more willing to accept is the tour’s West Coast swing finished on Sunday with Bubba Watson proving yet again that he is the ultimate horses-for-courses player, winning at Riviera Country Club for the third time in five years in what used to be the Northern Trust Open but is now the Genesis Open. Don’t try to figure that one out.

Watson now has 10 PGA Tour wins and seven of them have come on three courses: he’s won twice at Riviera; twice at the TPC River Highlands outside Hartford and twice at Augusta National—which, let’s face it, is a pretty good place to play some of your best golf.

Related: How Riviera helped Bubba Watson find his creative side again

Watson’s return to the land of the golf living makes him one of 43 players now favored to win the Masters. If you don’t believe me, just watch TV for a while. Every time a player makes back-to-back birdies, someone with a microphone says he’s ready to win the Masters. Unless the player is Tiger Woods. In that case, it only takes one birdie.  

So, what did we learn from the seven-event West Coast odyssey that began with Dustin Johnson destroying the Plantation Course on Maui and ended with Watson’s Hollywood finish?

A few thoughts:

• It isn’t that mere mortals can’t win on the PGA Tour anymore, but being able to hit the ball into outer space is becoming more and more of an advantage. The West Coast winners included Dustin Johnson, Watson, Jon Rahm, Jason Day and Gary Woodland—all bombers. Ted Potter Jr. and Patton Kizzire (who looks like he can hit the ball miles) were the only guys who came out on top who don’t hit the ball from one county to another on a regular basis.

Warren Little/Getty Images

• Slow play remains a huge issue, and the tour needs to stop trying to deny it. This has become an emperor’s new clothes type of deal: Commissioner Jay Monahan insists slow play isn’t an issue, so it’s not an issue. Even if you claim that J.B. Holmes appearing hypnotized for more than four minutes in the 18th fairway at Torrey Pines is an outlier, watching players prepare to play has become torture. Heck, even baseball has recognized the need to speed up play; does golf have to be even slower to get its act together? There’s only one way to do it: Penalize players strokes when they dilly-dally and give rules officials the authority to say, “You’re too slow, add one to your score.” NO APPEALS unless you can prove that an act of God was the reason why your threesome was playing at a six-hour pace.

• Tiger Woods, the official touring pro of the Golf Channel, has come a long way back after essentially not playing for more than two years. But he also still has a long way to go. Remember he made the cut on the number in San Diego and putted like a madman to finish T-23. Last week at Riviera, he putted well enough Thursday (25 putts) to give himself a chance to make the weekend, then fell apart Friday and missed the cut comfortably. The good news? He feels healthy enough to try to play in back-to-back events, teeing it up this week at the Honda Classic. But it’s a long way from here to the back nine on Sunday at Augusta.    

Michael Reaves/Getty Images

• Phil Mickelson can still play. He still hasn’t won since the 2013 Open Championship, but there’s clearly some magic in those lefty clubs even as he closes in on birthday number 48. (I can already hear the crowds at Shinnecock Hills singing Happy Birthday to him off-key on every tee during the third round of the U.S. Open). Mickelson had three straight top-six finishes out west where he always seems to play well: T-5 in Phoenix; T-2 at Pebble Beach and T-6 in L.A. He never seriously challenged to win, but played well enough each Sunday to give his fans legitimate hope that there’s one last moment of glory left in Lefty.

Matt Sullivan/Getty Images

• The two best stories out west had nothing to do with all the glamour boys who came out to play. Ted Potter Jr., who looks like he’d fit right in with most Saturday foursomes, held off the likes of Johnson, Jason Day and Mickelson to win at Pebble Beach, reminded us that you don’t have to look like you’re heading for a GQ shoot once you hole out on 18 to win on the tour. His win at Pebble wasn’t quite as unlikely as Vaughn Taylor coming out of golf purgatory there to hold off Mickelson two years ago, but it was pretty remarkable. And Woodland’s win at TPC Scottsdale had to tug at your heartstrings: He and his wife, Gabby, lost one of the twins she was carrying last March and their son, Jaxson, was born 10 weeks prematurely in June—but is doing fine now. When Woodland holed his final putt to beat Chez Reavie in a playoff he signaled to the sky to let his unborn daughter know he still loved her. That was the sweetest moment of the year to date.

Mike Ehrmann/Getty Images

• And the best news for golf? No, it wasn’t the non-stop analysis of all things Woods or even Rory McIlroy coming back to play well twice in the desert (Dubai, Abu Dhabi) and reasonably well (T-20) in Los Angeles. It was the return of Day (above), who was the best player in the world not named Jordan Spieth in 2015, but also went through a rough 2017 that included dealing with his mother’s cancer, his wife Ellie suffering a miscarriage and more injury woes. Day won in San Diego, beating Alex Noren in a two-day, six-hole playoff, and then finished T-2 at Pebble Beach. Add him to the list of favorites at Augusta. That makes 44.

Now comes the Florida-Mexico-Texas-Dominican Republic swing. You have to love golf’s traditions.

The post 6 takeaways from this year’s West Coast swing appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Dave Shedloski
A tale of the tape between the 54-hole co-leaders at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am surely would have proved to be a futile exercise, one that would have revealed the obvious. By any measure one could conjure, Dustin Johnson owned a significant advantage over Ted Potter Jr.

Tale of the tape? The golf cognoscenti likely was pondering the estimated amount of tape a bruised and battered Potter was going to require upon exiting Pebble Beach Golf Links. What chance did the unassuming left-hander, ranked 246th in the world, have against World No. 1 Johnson, the human howitzer?

Sure enough, it was no contest.

Ted Potter Jr. won going away.

In one of the biggest upsets in memory in a head-to-head duel on the PGA Tour, Potter plodded his way to a careful three-under-par 69 on a crisp and breezy day on the Monterey Peninsula. In the process, the 34-year-old registered a three-stroke victory over Johnson, Phil Mickelson, Jason Day and Chez Reavie. The son of a golf course maintenance worker who had a club in his hands even before he could walk, Potter finished at 17-under 270 for his largest career paycheck, $1.322 million, slightly less than half his career earnings to date.

“It’s truly an unbelievable day,” said Potter, who doubled his PGA Tour victory total to two—coincidentally, the same number of steel plates inserted in the right ankle he broke in 2014 that derailed what finally was looking like a blossoming career. “I will remember this day forever.”

As well he should. Aside from his victory in the 2012 Greenbrier Classic in his rookie year, Potter’s most memorable triumph was beating Matt Kuchar in the Masters Par-3 Contest the following year. This win gives him another shot at Augusta National (short and big course) as well as starts in the Players and PGA Championship. 

Jeff Gross/Getty Images
Potter, ranked 246th in the world, stood apart on Sunday as he kept calm and claimed his second career PGA Tour title.

Potter’s voice cracked several times as he recalled his difficult comeback the last few years as well as his bumpy journey to this point. He turned professional after high school in his native Florida and racked up close to 60 wins on various mini-tours, he estimated. But his Web.com Tour career got off to an inauspicious beginning as he missed the cut in all 24 starts in his rookie year in 2004 and he played the weekend only three times in his first 44 events. Before Sunday, Potter had only posted three top-10 finishes and 37 made cuts in 83 starts.

If nothing else, the soft-spoken left-hander, who never has had help with his swing except from his father, Ted, and his caddie, John Balmer, is a hardened competitor. “It definitely helps to draw from past experience coming down the stretch,” Potter said. “It doesn’t matter what kind of tournament it is. … So, I think I know how to control myself and the nerves coming down the stretch. It’s just that you still got to execute the shot.”

A natural right-hander who turned the golf club upside down (a là Mickelson) to stand opposite his father and copy his swing, Potter began the day with a shaky three-putt bogey on the par-4 first. It’s what you might expect from a guy playing with his first 54-hole lead and who in his last event, at the Farmers Insurance Open, cratered to a final-round 82.

When Johnson unleashed a 321-yard laser tee shot at the par-5 second, and Potter answered with a poke of 273 yards with his whippy sawed-off swing, it appeared that someone was in for a long day. Who figured it would be Johnson?

“I’m sure everyone knew Dustin probably was going to win the golf tournament,” Potter allowed. “What do I got to lose, really? Just go out there and try to play the best golf I could today and see what happens. Why put more pressure on myself to say I’m playing against the World No. 1? Just go play golf.”

Potter calmly canceled Johnson’s stress-free two-putt birdie with a birdie of his own, getting up and down from behind the green, and he did the same at the par-5 sixth despite giving up 52 yards off the tee to Johnson’s 317-yard 3-iron.

The turning point came at the iconic little par-3 seventh when both men flew tee shots over the green. From roughly a few paces right of where Johnson pitched past the hole and failed to get up and down for par; Potter chipped in for birdie, his fourth in six holes and last of the day. The two-stroke swing gave Potter a two-shot lead that he protected with an array of steady par saves and high-percentage plays.

Related: Watch Jason Day save par from the beach next to Pebble’s 18

He was most proud of how he handled the pressure as the round progressed and how he kept Johnson, who admittedly wasn’t his sharpest, at bay.

“I think the way I finished the tournament coming down the stretch on the back nine. I struck the ball well and hit a lot of my targets out there coming in with the pressure on me,” the Ocala, Fla., native said. “I just hit a lot of quality golf shots coming down the stretch knowing I had to.”

“I played OK,” said Johnson, who closed with a 72 and missed a chance to win this event for a third time. “Definitely a few iron shots cost me a couple of bogeys. I would have liked to put a little more pressure on Ted.” 

Jeff Gross/Getty Images
Johnson, a two-time winner at Pebble, couldn’t pick up any momentum on Sunday, settling for a even-par 72 and a T-2 finish.

For the second time in three years this storied tournament produced an improbable winner. Vaughn Taylor, who hadn’t won in 11 years on the PGA Tour, outlasted Mickelson in the 2016 edition after getting in as an alternate. He was 447th in the world at the time.

Potter, who lost nearly two full seasons in 2015 and ’16 because of the aforementioned ankle injury, stymied not only Johnson, but also Mickelson (who shot 67 and still is winless since the 2013 Open Championship), former No. 1 Day (70), the suddenly dangerous Reavie (68) and World No 2 Jon Rahm, who started the day three back, climbed within two of the lead, and then drifted back with an inward 42 and four-over 76.

None were a match for the unassuming Potter, who led the field with 24 birdies and played his final 46 holes in 15 under par after suffering four straight bogeys on Friday at Spyglass Hill that dropped him to two under par.

That’s quite a bounce back, but that’s something Potter has long become used to. He couldn’t play for five months as he waited for his ankle to mend with the help of two steel plates and 12 screws in it. The downtime was killing a man who loves the game, loves his job. The idle time allowed some doubt to creep into his mind.

“It was a struggle there. You don’t know what is going to happen to your golf game,” he admitted.

He still has a bit of pain in his ankle. But his golf game is sound. Ted Potter might never achieve the consistency he expects of himself, but his flashes of brilliance are good enough.

It’s a wonderful tale. Check the tape.

The post The underdog has his day as Potter Jr. wins at Pebble Beach appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By John Strege
Dustin Johnson, not unexpectedly, soon was alone at the top of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am leader board on Saturday, when entirely unexpectedly a relatively obscure interloper overtook him.

Ted Potter Jr. flirted with a 59 at Monterey Peninsula Country Club, before bogeying his final two holes to settle for a nine-under par 62 and a share of the 54-hole lead with Johnson.

Jason Day, meanwhile, quietly played himself into contention. Day, who won the Farmers Insurance Open two weeks ago, shot a three-under par 69 at Pebble Beach Golf Links to get within two of the lead.    
Potter, a left-hander whose lone PGA Tour victory came at the Greenbrier Classic in 2012, had nine birdies and an eagle to momentarily take a two-stroke lead before his late stumble. Johnson went out in four-under par 32 at Pebble Beach and appeared headed for his third victory in the event before the back nine tripped him up and he settled for a two-under par 70.

“Once we turned and came back into the wind from 11 to the house, the course definitely played pretty tough,” Johnson said. “But it was still out there. I still had a bunch of chances. I just hit a lot of good putts that didn’t go in and got out of position on a couple holes, which was the only time I made the bogeys, and it really was just from the second shots on those. I know where I can’t hit it and I hit it there anyway. But tomorrow hopefully will be a little bit sharper.”

Beau Hossler, who shared the 36-hole lead with Johnson, made four bogeys at Monterey Peninsula CC after played the first two rounds bogey-free. He settled for a three-over par 74 to fall into a tie for ninth.

Steve Stricker, who will turn 51 in two weeks, is tied for the lead, three of the lead following a round of two-under 70 at Pebble Beach.

“I still feel like I’m capable of winning out here,” he said. “Obviously I’ve got to do a lot of good things to do it.”

The post Dustin Johnson, Ted Potter Jr. tied for lead at AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Dave Shedloski
The vicissitudes of golf are such that a man can wake up and believe, for no particular reason, that he can shoot a 66 that day, a score that he had managed to post only once in his last 34 PGA Tour starts dating to 2014.

Such optimism seems only slightly short of insane, but that’s how Ted Potter, Jr., felt Saturday morning before his third round of the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am. There was no revelation that struck him, no omens to draw on, no epiphany in his game that initiated the confidence with which he challenged Monterey Peninsula CC.

“I just thought I might be able to get to double digits, put myself in position for a nice finish,” he said of his goal for the afternoon.   

Uh huh.

After rounds of 68 and 71 at Pebble Beach Golf Links and Spyglass Hill, respectively, the one-time tour winner from Ocala, Fla., would need a 66 to reach double digits under par for the tournament. True, he had fired a 6-under 66 to open the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines in his last start, which placed him one off the lead. Then he imploded with 75, 74 and 82 to end up T-73.

Not exactly a string of confidence builders.

But the portly left-hander got off to a hot start with birdies on his first four holes. Then he made another birdie and an eagle to go out in 7-under-par 30 on the back nine. He turned to the front and sank a long putt from off the green at No. 1. Then he dribbled in a 35-footer at the second. He birdied Nos. 4 and 6.

Forget 66. He was on his way to 59.

“Thought about it,” he said.

Bogeys on his final two holes squelched that. Still, his 9-under 62, pulled out of nowhere except some glass-half-full province of his golfer’s brain, was a stellar piece of work that left him in a tie for first at 14-under 201. His reward is a tee time at 9:35 a.m. PST in the final group with his pro-am partner, Seattle businessman Sean Kell, and world No. 1 Dustin Johnson, who turned his last 54-hole lead into an eight-stroke romp in last month’s Sentry Tournament of Champions.

Related: Dustin Johnson, Ted Potter Jr. tied for lead at AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am

No one would ever mistake Potter for the ridiculously lithe and athletic 6-4 physical specimen he is paired with, a guy playing with supreme confidence. But just as there are no numbers on a scorecard, there also are no mirrors.

Taught the game by his father, just like Johnson was by his dad, Potter has enough game to add to his lone PGA Tour win at the 2012 Greenbrier Classic. But it’s been awhile since he has had such a prime opportunity, and that could be an issue.

“I feel good about my game right now. Obviously, I played well today, and as long as I can just keep the nerves under control I’ll be fine,” he said.

“I haven’t been in contention too much, really. I’ve had some good tournaments, but I need to get there more often to get comfortable there,” Potter, 34 years old, added. “Tomorrow will be a good test for me and to see how it goes. But I’ve been working on my swing and trying to get everything right there, and the swing’s getting to the point where I feel good about it. Now it’s just getting comfortable playing at a high level.”

The swing went awry at Torrey Pines, the fade that he fights becoming a slice that cut up his scoring chances and sent him spiraling down the leader board. But he should cut himself some slack. He really hasn’t been the same since he broke his ankle stepping off a curb in 2014, an injury that required two surgeries. Potter lost all of 2015 and only made two tour starts in 2016. He returned to the Web.com Tour last year and regained his PGA Tour status by finishing 10th in earnings on the strength of six top-10 finishes, including a pair of seconds.

The ankle still bothers him. “It still gets sore at the end of the day, but I can swing the golf club and I can get around 18 holes, so I feel good about that,” he said. “But it’s still going to be awhile before it’s like a hundred percent. But it feels good enough to play at this level.”

If it can hold up for at least one more day, he’ll have quite a comeback story. But this is an opportunity he has been working towards his whole life. He began playing golf when he was two. “But I’ve been holding a club before I could walk.”

At 19 he turned pro after graduating from high school.

“I’ve never been into schoolwork and stuff like that,” he admitted.

He’s endured a long learning curve, sure, but he can draw on some past successes, be they mini-tour wins or his victory at the Greenbrier. In 2013 here, Potter held the 36-hole lead before posting a T-16 finish.

“Yeah, it’s good. That’s another thing, I’ve played well here in the past and I think that helps, drawing on past experience,” he said. “It’s definitely a fun week, it’s a relaxing week. You got amateur partners and just go out there and talk with them and just kind of enjoy the moment out there. And you got beautiful views, and, I mean, it’s just a great place to be.”

Indeed, it is. And no one would have seen it coming. Except Ted Potter, who had visions of doing something special Saturday and made it happen. No one can explain it. No one could even try. Ted Potter couldn’t explain it either.

“I don’t know. I just wanted to shoot a good score and see what happens,” he said.

Golf happened. That’s all.

The post Ted Potter Jr. ‘thought’ he might shoot 66, posts 62 instead, ties Dustin Johnson for AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am lead appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.